Colorado gets $1 million to study lengthening school days

Colorado Classroom covers local and state education issues affecting K-12 and higher education students in the state of Colorado.

WASHINGTON — A pilot program in Colorado that requires schoolkids to give up the traditional school day in favor of a schedule that more closely mirrors the workday of their parents got a big lift Monday.

Nine schools in four Denver-area school districts received money to implement and study a longer school day in 2013 so researchers can determine whether more time in school means higher success for students.

Gov. John Hickenlooper accepted the $1 million from the nonprofit Ford Foundation and the National Center on Time and Learning.

The money, divided over three years, will go to implementing the extra time — some 1,440 hours a year — at the nine elementary, middle and high schools in Adams County, Boulder Valley, Denver Public Schools and Jefferson County.

"The common theme you hear again and again is you need more time with the kids, whether it's a rural school district, whether it's an urban school district, whether it's out in an affluent suburb," Hickenlooper said in a speech. "The kids, especially the kids coming from difficult neighborhoods, broken families, single parents, that extra time with their teachers ... means all the world."

Once the programs are launched in the 2013-14 school year, student achievement will also be watched to gauge whether more time in math and reading — as well as art and other cultural activities — boosts grades and test scores.

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Because union contracts already dictate an eight-hour workday, Hickenlooper said elongating the day is a matter of shifting teacher schedules — and shouldn't cost districts a lot of extra money.

Fifty-four schools in Colorado already have longer school days, but, with the exception of a few charter schools, the programs are new and still in formative stages.

Robert Beam, principal of Denver's Johnson Elementary, started a longer school day this year.

He shifted schedules so students received an additional 70 minutes a day of time that includes extra math and reading help, as well as technology, physical education and art.

"Once you hear about extra time, from an equity standpoint, it makes sense," said Beam, whose school has more than 95 percent of kids living in poverty. "Our kids need these things. We want to make sure our kids get an equitable education."

Beam is parlaying $250,000 in grant money this year to pay his first- through fifth-grade teachers for an extra hour of instruction a day. He hopes that in a couple of years, by staggering teacher start times, his program can be administered within his existing budget.

Hickenlooper said it makes no sense for every teacher to start at the same time every day and then scoot kids out of the building early in the afternoon — especially for those kids who don't have parents getting home from work for several hours.

"I'm not sure who, except the students, would fight against requiring that they're structured until 5 p.m.," Hickenlooper said. "What we're trying to do is enhance flexibility."

Hickenlooper was right about the students complaining.

Monday at Kepner Middle School, which is among the schools that will launch the longer school days next year, students mostly groused that they didn't want to spend any more time in class.

"I think there should not be more time because it's too long," said Champane Martinez, a seventh-grader. "Everyone will start complaining. More people are going to ditch."

The nine schools that will participate in the longer days are free to tailor the 2013-14 programs as they see fit, said Helayne Jones, executive director of the Colorado Legacy Foundation, which is helping administer the program.

Some elementary schools might add an extra hour of cultural learning. Rhonda Haniford, the principal at Boulder Valley's Centaurus High School, says she wants to experiment with internships for class credit.

Frederick Hess, a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute who has written five books on education reform, said longer school days will make a difference only if done well.

"One reason some schools do poorly is that these schools are tedious, boring places where kids aren't learning anything," Hess said. "So telling a kid who is not learning anything to sit through more boringness is not going to work."

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